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Sunday, December 2, 2012

Windows Phone 8: Is it Really More Popular than Phone 7?

It seems that Microsoft is affronted with continuous gossips on the sales figures of its products. What made me say so is the latest report on Steve Ballmer’s claim that the sale of Windows Phone 8 is four times higher than the sale of Windows Phone 7 last year. Ballmer, CEO of Microsoft, had declared just days ago that the company had sold more than 40 million Windows 8 OS licenses. This time Ballmer gave no exact figures, but just a vague, plain and flat statement. My point here is why Microsoft is hesitant to release the exact number when they could do the same with Windows 8 OS.

Microsoft launched Windows Phone 8 in the second half of October 2012. Though initially it was expected to give an explosive response now that more than a month has passed by several experts are of the opinion that sales are not as hot as anticipated. Probably Microsoft wanted to clear the mess surrounding the sales estimates. However Ballmer’s address at the shareholder’s meeting lack hard number, adding fuel to the gossips. Anyways Shanghai Securities News reports that Nokia alone has given orders for 2.5 million Lumia 920 handsets in the past 20 days which is almost close to 2.76 million Windows Phone handsets sold in the fourth quarter of 2011. It is expected that Nokia will sell more Lumia 920 handsets in this quarter than all Windows Phone OEMs sold in the year 2011. Amidst all speculations related to uncertainties in sales figures of Windows Phone 8, I am providing an insight to its features that will help you to know the device in a better way.

Apart from providing a tile experience, Windows Phone 8 is also a collection of Hubs. The Wallet App lets you make payments via mobile phone. For someone who is passionate about photography, Windows Phone 8 is a valuable gift. You can even read messages from Facebook, WhatsApp, or a mail even when the phone is in locked form. Speaking about the IE 10 browser in Windows Phone 8, it loads even the most complex pages quickly. Xbox SmartGlass makes your entertaining moments superb. The Kid’s Corner app lets you provide restricted access of the smartphone to your kid. Though the handset carries several mind blowing attributes, it also has its own share of glitches, which Microsoft has already assured to take care of. In fact an OTA update will be soon underway to fix at least the random reboot issue.

I am aware that several of my readers own a Windows Phone 7.5; and they may wish to upgrade it to Windows Phone 8. Unfortunately, it is not possible. Hey, don’t get despaired. Here is good news for you. Microsoft is launching Windows Phone 7.8 very soon. Most probably it will reach you by early 2013. The company is targeting specially you, 7.5 users. So please wait for that.

The video underneath is an end user's perspective on Windows Phone 8. Before actually showering his views on this new OS, he fiddled with it for almost a week.